I really wish I could find my 4th grade teacher. We were stationed on Okinawa at the time, and I went to an off-base Christian school. Mrs. Freeman was the best teacher, and now that I homeschool, I can see that a lot of what she did really was "classical" before that was really a thing. She really emphasized memory work, and I can still recite so many of the things we memorized that year (Bible passages, several verses of the Star-Spangled Banner, the Presidents, etc.). She was a very young teacher back then, newly married to an enlisted guy, and I later heard they had adopted a baby from Korea. Her name is too common though. I'd love to tell her how much she influenced me!

Dh's company had their annual Christmas party tonight, and the president gave every employee an "amazon fire TV". That's great--except we really have no idea what this does or what we'd use it for. We currently have a TV but no cable package. I literally never watch TV (I didn't grow up with a TV, and it's never been a favorite thing of mine), and my kids sometimes watch stuff like Great British Bakeoff or Dancing with the Stars on youtube or occasionally stream something. The kids play some minecraft and pokemon, but that's about it. Clearly we are not very tech-savvy or really tech-interested--at least for me and dh, lol. Even when I read stuff about this fire tv thing, I don't even really understand what they're saying, or why it could be of benefit. Could someone please explain what to do with this slowly, like you were talking to a really slow toddler, one who hasn't kept up with any TV-related advances in the past oh, 10-15 years (we never even did the tivo thing or anything like that, lol)?? Thank you for your patience!

Well, what do you know?! Ha! I should have just stuck with Stanford last year, at least. Instead I spent countless hours refiguring the testing schedule for all the grades for the Iowa test. So now the big decision is, do I go back to Stanford, even though it is old and uncertain, or just stick with Iowa, which people didn't like as much because of the time limits . . . . hmmmm . . . Well, this is why I get paid the big bucks. NOT! Haha, I crack myself up!

Where are you getting the Stanford tests from? I'm the testing coordinator for our co-op, and BJU Press said that last year (2016--June, I think) was the last year Stanford tests would be offered, because the publisher, Pearson, wasn't going to make or support them anymore. Has something changed? If not, you might have to have new tests anyway! We went ahead and used ITBS in May, and I would much rather have stuck with Stanford. I especially liked the untimed aspect. I think it was a lot less stressful for younger kids in particular.

One of our favorites too. We've read all those (or listened to them on car trips). Great books, all of them!

We got our paper copy today (in VA)! I was absolutely shocked! ETA: Technically it was "yesterday", Dec. 5, since I'm writing this Tuesday morning at 12:30 AM, LOL. I just finished prepping for the biology and life science classes I'm teaching tomorrow (well, today . . .). Must get to bed!

There is no way Apologia prepares for the AP bio test. Even BJU biology, which is much more rigorous that Apologia, really doesn't. For just a small example, the AP exam has several grid-in questions that have mathematical answers. There aren't that many kinds of problems in biology that will be like that, so you can pretty much figure out what the options most likely will be--things like Hardy-Weinburg equilibrium problems, chi-square analysis of data (probably in a genetics problems so they can kill 2 birds with one stone), calculating base pair size from an electrophoresis gel using a semi-log scale, bacterial transformation efficiency, water potential and solute potential . . . . things like that. Some (not all) of these concepts are at least mentioned in BJU, but students are not required to know how to solve problems or in any way be familiar with the formulas or whatnot. I don't think most of these concepts are even mentioned in Apologia. And of course the evolution emphasis is huge and must be studied. Full disclosure: I am a young earth creationist, but I have taught AP biology for several years now, and my students have gotten all 4's and 5's, so clearly I am able to convey the concepts. It's a whole new level of familiarity with cladograms, phylogenetic trees, half-lives and carbon dating (another grid-in possibility!), and just lots of new vocab in this area compared to what they would learn in Apologia, BJU, etc. As always in these threads, I'll give my recommendation for study guides. I really like the "Pearson Education Test Prep Series for AP Biology" by the Holtzclaws. It was written to accompany the big Campbell and Reece, which is pretty much the definitive AP bio text, and it is the only test prep book that has a handle on the redesigned test and has questions that line up with it.

Yes, this is how I understood it as well. One of the moms in our little high school co-op asked me the same question. I searched serviceacademyforums.com, and Corraleno's answer was what they came back with. My friend did call someone at NROTC headquarters (NOT a recruiter--they rarely know very much about ROTC and can give wrong information), and he agreed that was the correct interpretation, even though it was poorly worded.

I'm having my 9th grader take it in November. Math-wise, he's the same as your child, but he's not an excellent writer by any stretch, so I'm not having him do the writing portion. My reason for having him take it is that his next older brother is taking it for the last time that same day, and he'll be able to drive in with his brother, who will also show him the ropes about checking in. DS3 is a more nervous type in new situations, so I think going in with older brother will help him feel more comfortable going alone in future years. If it weren't for his older brother, I'd have him wait until spring semester of his sophomore year.

I've done the name/meaning matching game before as well. I also made up a "mad-libs' style story, and I go around the room, asking people to give me a noun, adjective, etc. At the end, when I read it, it's a "birth story" of sorts. That's usually pretty funny, although you have to have a group that actually knows parts of speech, so it's not embarrassing, lol (or tell them "a thing" or "a describing word"). I also made up a matching game using lines from famous children's story books (like Madeline, Go Dog, Go, Little Engine that Could--those kinds of books). If anyone is remotely interested in these games, I'm happy to send them to you! Just message me. I am *not* a huge game person at all, but these weren't too painful to play, lol.

No, that's not really what I was talking about, and I used the wrong terms, I think! My niece did a work CO-OP, I think the term is, where she went to school for a semester, then worked for a certain company for a semester, and kept on like that. Then she get an excellent job after graduating (as an industrial engineer) because she already had so much experience. It wasn't anything tied to need, but something she got through contacts at her university (Pitt). It certainly worked out well for her, though!

When our second son goes off to college next summer, we'll have 2 in college, and we'll continue to have 2 kids in college for the next 18 years--except for the 2 years when we'll have 3 in college. Just wanted to make everyone else feel better, lol. My DH is the youngest of 6 kids. His parents paid for his oldest sister to attend a private Catholic university near their house, and also for her to spend a semester studying abroad. There was nothing left for anyone else, and that did cause a TON of resentment among the other kids. My DH ended up graduating from the Air Force Academy, so he didn't have to pay anything--but the relationship with that sister is quite strained. We knew we weren't going to spend a ton of money on the oldest at the expense of others, so we've pretty much said to them all that we don't feel it is our responsibility to pay for their college--scholarships, work-study programs, etc. are all good options. Like others have said, our job is to provide a rigorous education so that hopefully merit aid is a possibility (and to look for places where it is). My dh is a retired lieutenant colonel, so he has a good retirement--but we live in Northern VA, so a really high COL, plus all those kids, lol. He works as a government contractor now and will for the foreseeable future. A good salary plus retirement makes it so we will never in a million years qualify for any need aid. DS1 is on a 4 year ROTC scholarship that pays full tuition, fees, and books, plus gives him a monthly stipend. He also received several smaller scholarships that are covering about half his room and board. DS2 is applying now to colleges. He is also applying for an ROTC scholarship, but thanks to this board, a good safety for him (as a future engineering major) is University of Alabama-Huntsville, since it gives automatic merit aid, and he qualifies for free tuition there. He is not as interested in ROTC, although he sees it as a good way to pay for college and have a job right out of college. If he gets a scholarship and does ROTC in college, he would definitely be a "5 and dive" type--I don't see the military as a career for him. DS3 will not have a military option, since he has a peanut allergy and asthma, which are not waiverable conditions. It's hard for me to not have ROTC as a fall-back for him, honestly. He just took the PSAT for the first time Wednesday, and he'll take the SAT next month for the first time (he's a freshman). I am quite curious to see what his baseline scores will be, since merit aid will be very important for him. And who knows about the others?! We have relatives who have done work-study or internship programs that have worked very well. I will definitely be looking into things like that in the future. We trust the Lord will provide a way for each child, even if it doesn't look exactly like our plans or ideals.

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone who mentioned UAH on this thread. We are deep in the throes of applications with my second son, and just tonight (because of this thread!) I mentioned that UAH sounded like a very good possibility, since he wants to major in engineering, and he would be guaranteed a 100% scholarship. I have fond memories of Huntsville, and we almost were stationed there--we turned down an assignment there to come here to Chantilly--and I think he'd like it too. He looked into it a bit more, and now it's on his list! Yay--a safety!!

I think AP gov. is one of the easiest AP's to do at home. My oldest 2 sons have both self-studied and done very well on the AP exam. If you send me a PM, I'll email you my approved syllabus, which has all the books we used. Honestly though--my boys said the most practical resource they used was the REA's AP Government Crash Course test prep book.

We do a lot of memory work. When my oldest kids were young, we just sat on the couch and memorized more and more of Bible passages, poems, speeches, etc., going over it all each day as part of our "together" stuff. We did CC for one year when my oldest was in 7th grade. While there was good about CC, some things drove me nuts, so a friend and I started our own small junior high (eventually senior high) co-op. For our younger kids, who were away in the morning at an elementary co-op we'd all done for years, I put together an afternoon memory work program. I used CC as a general guide, but I tweaked things a lot. I decided on just a 32 point timeline, but I included dates. In subsequent years we added the kings and queens of England as well as the Presidents, and now we do all 3 things every year. We do science facts that line up with what the older kids are doing in their science class, as well as Bible passages and poems. We also do mapwork that lines up with Tapestry of Grace, since that's what we use for history for the older grades. I now have a 4 year rotation of this, with everything divided out by weeks, for what to work on. We just keep going over the old stuff, adding on the new stuff. It's been so beneficial for my kids. My oldest is a sophomore at Virginia Tech, and he has mentioned several times how useful it has been to be able to memorize well and quickly. He's in the Corps, so there is much memorization required there of various random facts! And I love that they can spout off "St. Crispian's Day Speech" or "In Flanders Fields" or whatever during appropriate moments. It's been good for me too!

My ds is right there with yours! He's actually starting on Tuesday, due to me being unorganized about actually getting signed up, getting me an account, etc. Ah well. Fortunately he's a senior, and he's already had a bunch of AP's so at least he knows what they are like, etc. We'll see anyways . . .

I delivered #10 in September of DS1's senior year of high school. As he was holding her, he said, "You know, my whole life has been the family getting bigger, and babies getting added to the family. Verity's whole life will be people leaving, and the family getting smaller." With my post-partum hormones, that about did me in! But he was really faithful last year about skyping with his younger siblings so they could show him their lost tooth, etc. I didn't have so much trouble with him leaving because, well, there were still 9 kids left who needed me. I'll probably be a mess when #10 heads off! Or maybe I'll be insane by then, lol.

We love the St. Crispin's Day speech. Also, we memorize the kings and queens of England by houses. That has come in very handy for keeping a handle on when historic events.

Yes, DS2 is planning on doing it! I need to prod him to actually get signed up and everything put on his computer, so this is a good reminder.

DS1 took a Corelle salad plate and bowl to college, and some utensils from a pattern we no longer use. He told us later he also needed a medium size plastic mixing bowl so he and his roommates could mix pancake batter!

Yes!!! Thank you! I already found the answer to my immediate question (about what my title should be). Whew! If I had remembered that it was swimmermom who actually started the thread, that might have been helpful, but I fear I am just a pathetic googler, lol. And I did edit the title. My oldest didn't apply to any common app schools, and I was pretty happy about that. Now I've got to get up to speed for DS2!

No, not the one I was thinking of! The one I was thinking of started at the beginning of the admissions cycle, where she set up a dummy account as a student so she could see the common app from that side of it. It was so helpful, and now that I'm working through the process, I have questions I **know* got answered in that thread, but I can't find a trace of it anywhere! Thank you SO much for looking, though! I really appreciate it! I'll try again myself once I get kiddos to bed . . .

Could someone possibly link me to that big thread on the common app that Sebastian started last year? I apparently never bookmarked it, and I can not find it by searching or even with google. I'm going crazy here! Thank you!

Yes, both SAT 2 review books I have here in front of me review animal organ systems, so I would say the test covers them. I just asked my son, who took it in June, and he doesn't remember too much anatomy & physiology though, so maybe it's not heavily emphasized. Maybe what you should do is invest in a few review books and just let him do the organ systems sections of those, instead of the chapters in the textbook.

Ha, we are at my parents' house right now, and Prince Valiant is in their paper. I glanced at it and wondered the same thing this afternoon: Who reads this anymore?! Too funny to see this thread now!